What do you do when you feel overwhelmed? Have you thought about it?
How does your body feel? What’s going on in your mind? How’s your productivity?
I’ve been thinking about these things a lot lately, and paying attention to my own (not great) habits. After noticing my tendency to just not do anything worthwhile when I’m overwhelmed, I started wondering why. Then I started wondering how to fix it and move on.
The biggest problem here is that I’m pretty overwhelmed right now, which — true to form — is making me totally unproductive.
I have had to force myself to sit down each day and tackle the things that are making me feel like I’m under water. Including writing this blog post.
When you’re trying to build a business for yourself that is reliant on writing and showcasing yourself as an expert in a particular field through your writing, it’s pretty important to keep… writing.
But building a business is overwhelming (and frustrating as heck, but that’s a different topic altogether). Learning how to use social media to market myself has been a lot. Researching and cold-emailing prospective clients is waaaaay out of my comfort zone.
As usual, I decided to use my current struggles to frame a blog post that I hope will help other people while simultaneously helping myself. Bonus!
As I try to begin a career in freelance educational content production and editing in earnest, I find that I’m faced with the unease of starting something new. I need to market myself and my skills, which generally leaves me feeling overwhelmed and sick to my stomach.
I know that I am a capable and competent writer and that I have expertise in some areas (namely social and emotional learning). This isn’t enough to get a career off the ground, however. I need to have connections. And to make connections I need to network… and sell myself.
UGH networking and selling myself. Both of those things make me extra super uncomfortable!
So my question as I got started was: How on earth do I sell myself as a writer, copy editor, and curriculum developer?
The answer didn’t excite me.
Lots of sites said I should start working on my social media strategy. I’ve been a casual social media user since the days of MySpace, but have mostly kept to personal updates on Facebook intended for my close friends and family. I’ve dabbled in Instagram and Twitter, but haven’t really found footing there yet. LinkedIn has always been a bit of a mystery to me, honestly! I have posted a couple things there but I have no idea what I’m doing.
Which leads me to this:
I have no idea what I’m doing with my “social media strategy” in general.
I’ve never had a social media strategy — and venturing out on this with no experience scares me. I can feel my anxiety start to creep in.
It makes me want to not even start.
Here are the questions that swirl around in my head, especially when I think about making short-form videos like Instagram Reels:
What could I possibly say that anyone would care about?
How can I ever come up with enough content related to the subjects I write about on my blog?
Will all of this effort actually help me?
How do I ensure the privacy and safety of my family?
Do I even want videos of myself out there for all to see?
I don’t know the answers to any of these questions. But I do know that if I don’t try it, I’ll never know.
So, I’ve decided to just start, and to make the fumbles and failures along the way a part of my exploration on my blog. This will be an exercise in self-compassion for sure! It will likely be a long and bumpy road, and I need to be kind to myself.
Maybe my social media strategy will fizzle and I’ll never get it truly off the ground. On the other hand, maybe it’ll be something I find enjoyable and that others eventually connect with.
I’m going to hope for the best on this one, but if the worst happens (what’s the worst that could happen?!) I’ll be okay, too.
I saw this tweet the day after I wrote this post and it made me laugh out loud. 😀
Here’s what I’ve done so far:
Made a content calendar (that I’m already behind on! Haha)
Listed blog ideas
Listed reel ideas
Started a few blog drafts (including this one)
Listing things and making plans always makes me feel better when I don’t want to start something.
What do you do when you’re afraid to start something new?
The days leading up to winter break 2020 were some of the most difficult, in terms of my mental health, that I’d experienced in a very long time.
I’m generally fairly vulnerable in my blog writing, but in order to do this issue justice, I’m going to have to really make myself uncomfortable here. I’m tense and sweaty even thinking about it! But I imagine that there are other people out there who have been or are on the verge of being in the same situation. So… here we go.
Though I wrote this original post when we were still in the midst of the pandemic, I believe that we can now read it as a “lessons learned” piece. The five tips toward the end of the article are things that we should still be doing. All the time. Let me know what you think in the comments! What pandemic-era lessons have carried through for you?
In March 2020 — Friday the 13th, I’m pretty sure, actually — when I went to pick up my kids from school, I had no idea that would be the last time I would do that for about a year. I’m on the verge of tears even writing that. I had no idea that our interactions with loved ones would be so limited and strange for so long. I had no idea the wild emotional ride we were about to begin.
Kids all over the world were jolted out of what was normal and plunged into this weird, isolated, anxiety-filled environment. Whether you’re a parent, teacher, or other caregiver, I know you can probably relate to all of the things I’m about to say about how the pandemic has affected kids.
And, whether things are opening back up where you live or not, things won’t be “normal” for a long time. In this post, I may be stating a lot of obvious things, but my hope is that it will help us to feel connected and not so alone. I also hope to provide a few strategies for helping kids persevere through this challenging time, some of which includes strengthening their social and emotional competencies.
As I mentioned before, there’s a new little life in our household. Baby L is healthy as can be, though she’d already suffered through her first cold before she was 2 months old.
Our 4-year-old son, however, has been sick more times than I can count. If you have little kids, you know. It’s ridiculous. The first few years are just a total snotfest.
In fact, one of my nicknames for Z is Boogie. Not because he loves to dance (that’s what my sweet, innocent mom thought), but because, until he was about 3, he almost always had a nose full of boogers. Guuuuuhross.
Anyway, L is still pretty little. If she gets really sick, I’m going to be a wreck. I have anxiety, and anytime something is wrong with the girl I go all worst-case-scenario and freak the heck out.
The other day I took her to the doctor because one of her hands was randomly turning red and looked puffy, and then it would go away and come back. I was imagining that she had some kind of crazy blood clot that was slowly making its way to her brain.
I’ve always been the kind of person whose motto is “expect the worst, but hope for the best.” I know, that’s totally not positive and seems counter to the general vibe of this blog.
But that’s me, in reality.
I really try to avoid getting my hopes up, because I would rather be joyful at an unexpectedly good outcome than bummed at an unexpectedly bad one. I believe this is what we call “self-preservation.” Here’s why:
Ever since I was in fifth grade, I’ve suffered from moderate anxiety and depression. (Interestingly, the National Institute of Mental Health notes that the average age at which people begin to suffer from anxiety is eleven years old.) In my case, the depression usually follows an episode of high anxiety.
In this post, I’m going to delve into my own struggles and explain why I (and others) think it’s worthwhile to talk about them. I’ve noticed that there’s been a movement lately to get people talking about mental illnesses, to bring individual experiences out into the light in an effort to remove the stigma. I think that sharing our internal struggles with others is a kindness to ourselves, but is also a kindness to those who may feel alone.
